putoelquelolea

Zeppelin - How Many More Times

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Yes, with three caveats:

1. The pin factories would need to continue paying all their employees a full salary for a half-day of work.

2. Someone - or some entity - would need to enforce point number one, as this measure goes against the general principles of administrative efficiency.

3. Whatever entity assumes the power of dictating counter-intuitive administration policies, inevitably begs the question: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

In the end, you would only substitute the tyranny of the bourgeoise for the tyranny of interventionism

Absolutely. But is working a half-day for full wages a decent working condition that should be provided to all workers? And again, who is going to enforce that rule?

Is that achievable in the real world? The problem with any system is that power tends to be wielded by “representatives”

And did the oppressive state “wither away” into a Dictatorship of the Proletariat as hypothesized by Marx in both instances? Or was the tyranny of the bourgeoisie simply replaced by the tyranny of the state?

Right, we have never seen the state wither away, only a series of hegemonies replacing the previous ones. This is the issue Orwell identified in his criticism of totalitarian Leninism.

Coming back to Russell’s scenario, how exactly would you implement an obligation to keep workers on full payroll for half-duty? And would you apply it only in the pin industry or expand it to all industries? What hand would force the tide back from the natural business tendency towards efficiency?

OK, let’s suppose that all governments are oppressive and all work is slavery. How do we stop being slaves to our work and stop being oppressed by our governments?

The Marxist-Leninist real world examples have only switched out one kind of slavery/oppression for another. I am not asking who watches the watchers as any kind of excuse or glibness. It is an honest question

Orwell wrote infantile fiction, and it’s frankly silly to call that a critique of Leninism.

I love the writings of Marx, Russell, Orwell and many others. I would never presume to call any of them infantile, but OK

Once again, the reality is that socialist states, whatever faults they may have, are a tangible improvement on capitalism.

I am not comparing right versus left. I am asking about the practical applications of the pin factory scenario

Coming back to Russell’s scenario, here’s the plan USSR had for reducing the work week. And what business tendency are you talking about in a socialist state such as USSR exactly? The industry is owned by the state, the purpose of the industry is to produce things for people living in the state. Work isn’t done to create wealth for people who own businesses, there is no inherent incentive to exploit the workers.

Business does not cease to exist in a socialist state, it only operates under different management. And management from the left can be just as oppressive as from the right. Both socialist and non-socialist countries have tossed around the idea of shortening the work week, and also implemented policies that made work feel like slavery. The big difference for the common citizen is not between right and left - it is between oppressive and non-oppressive governments.

What remains unanswered is: exactly what measures should be implemented to solve Russell’s critique? All I’m getting as an answer is philosophical statements that I mostly agree with, but no examples of practical implementation

So your concrete proposal for the problem of implementing Russell’s proposed solution to the pin factory situation, is to somehow recreate a failed system that never implemented it? OK